1889

Events in 1889 46

• 1803 – 1889 John Ericsson (1803-1889) Died 8 March 1889, aged 85 Swedish-American engineer Ericsson designed the ironclad USS Monitor, whose 1862 duel with CSS Virginia transformed naval warfare. He also pioneered the screw propeller for ships.
• 1808 – 1889 Jefferson Davis (1808-1889) Died 6 December 1889, aged 81 Davis served as the only president of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. After the war he was imprisoned for two years before being released without trial, and he spent his final decades writing and speaking in defense of the Confederate cause.
• 1811 – 1889 John Bright (1811-1889) Died 27 March 1889, aged 77 Bright was a British Radical and Liberal statesman who campaigned for free trade and electoral reform, co-founding the Anti-Corn Law League. He served in several Liberal cabinets under William Gladstone.
• 1812 – 1889 Robert Browning (1812-1889) Died 12 December 1889, aged 77 Browning was one of the leading poets of the Victorian era, known for his mastery of the dramatic monologue in works such as "My Last Duchess" and "The Ring and the Book." He died in Venice on the day his final collection, Asolando, was published in London.
• 1824 – 1889 Wilkie Collins (1824-1889) Died 23 September 1889, aged 65 Collins was an English novelist best known for The Woman in White and The Moonstone, works widely regarded as founding texts of detective and sensation fiction. He was a close friend and collaborator of Charles Dickens.
• 1826 – 1889 Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin (1826-1889) Died 10 May 1889, aged 63 Saltykov-Shchedrin was a leading Russian satirist whose novel The Golovlyov Family and other works savaged the corruption and cruelty of Russian provincial life under serfdom. He also served for decades as a government official and provincial administrator.
• 1828 – 1889 Nikolay Chernyshevsky (1828-1889) Died 29 October 1889, aged 61 Chernyshevsky was a Russian philosopher and writer whose novel What Is to Be Done? became a foundational text for generations of Russian revolutionaries, including Vladimir Lenin. He spent nearly two decades in Siberian exile for his radical politics.
• 1844 – 1889 Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889) Died 8 June 1889, aged 44 An English Jesuit priest and poet, Hopkins wrote densely innovative verse using his own "sprung rhythm" that went almost entirely unpublished in his lifetime. Poems such as "The Windhover" and "Pied Beauty" were released posthumously in 1918 and later recognized as among the finest of the Victorian era.
• 1858 – 1889 Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria (1858-1889) Died 30 January 1889, aged 30 Heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, Rudolf died in an apparent murder-suicide with his young mistress, Baroness Mary Vetsera, at his hunting lodge in Mayerling. The scandal, known as the Mayerling incident, altered the Habsburg succession and passed the heirship to his uncle Franz Ferdinand.
• 1889 – 1938 Carl von Ossietzky (1889-1938) Died 4 May 1938, aged 48 Ossietzky was a German pacifist journalist who exposed secret German rearmament. He won the 1935 Nobel Peace Prize while held in a concentration camp and died in custody from tuberculosis.
• 1889 – 1967 Claude Rains (1889-1967) Died 30 May 1967, aged 77 The British-born actor, known for roles in Casablanca and The Invisible Man, died at his farm in New Hampshire. He received four Academy Award nominations over his career without ever winning.
• 1889 – 1953 Edwin Hubble (1889-1953) Died 28 September 1953, aged 63 Edwin Hubble was an American astronomer whose observations demonstrated that the universe contains galaxies beyond the Milky Way and that it is expanding. His work provided the observational basis for the Big Bang theory and reshaped modern cosmology. The Hubble Space Telescope was later named in his honor.
• 1889 – 1957 Gabriela Mistral (1889-1957) Died 10 January 1957, aged 67 Chilean poet, educator, and diplomat who in 1945 became the first Latin American to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Her poetry drew heavily on themes of childhood, motherhood, and loss.
• 1889 – 1972 Igor Sikorsky (1889-1972) Died 26 October 1972, aged 83 Sikorsky was a Russian-American aviation pioneer who built some of the earliest successful multi-engine aircraft and later developed the first mass-produced helicopter, the VS-300. His helicopter designs became the basis for much of modern rotorcraft. He died at his home in Connecticut.
• 1889 – 1964 Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964) Died 27 May 1964, aged 74 Nehru was the first Prime Minister of independent India, serving from 1947 until his death. A leading figure in the independence movement alongside Gandhi, he shaped India's early foreign policy of non-alignment.
• 1889 – 1963 Jean Cocteau (1889-1963) Died 11 October 1963, aged 74 Jean Cocteau was a French poet, filmmaker and artist known for works including the film Beauty and the Beast and the novel Les Enfants Terribles. He worked across nearly every artistic medium and was elected to the Academie francaise. He reportedly died of a heart attack upon hearing of Edith Piaf's death the same day.
• 1889 – 1927 Li Dazhao (1889-1927) Died 28 April 1927, aged 37 Li Dazhao was a co-founder of the Chinese Communist Party and one of the first Chinese intellectuals to promote Marxism. The warlord Zhang Zuolin had him executed in Beijing.
• 1889 – 1951 Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) Died 29 April 1951, aged 62 Wittgenstein was an Austrian-born philosopher whose work reshaped 20th-century philosophy of language, logic, and mind. His Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and posthumously published Philosophical Investigations remain foundational texts in analytic philosophy. He spent much of his later career at Cambridge University, where he died.
• 1889 – 1933 Luis Sánchez Cerro (1889-1933) Died 30 April 1933, aged 43 Army officer and president of Peru who took power in a 1930 coup and was later elected. He was assassinated in Lima by a member of APRA.
• 1889 – 1932 Manuel II of Portugal (1889-1932) Died 2 July 1932, aged 42 Portugal's last king was deposed by the republican revolution of 1910 and died in exile in England.
• 1889 – 1938 Pearl White (1889-1938) Died 4 August 1938, aged 49 Pearl White was an American silent film actress who starred in the serial The Perils of Pauline.
• 1889 – 1943 R. G. Collingwood (1889-1943) Died 9 January 1943, aged 53 Robin George Collingwood was an English philosopher, historian and archaeologist of Roman Britain. His works include The Principles of Art and The Idea of History, which was published after his death. He argued that historians must re-enact past thought.
• 1889 – 1953 Robert A. Taft (1889-1953) Died 31 July 1953, aged 63 Robert A. Taft was a US Senator from Ohio and a leading conservative voice in the Republican Party, known as "Mr. Republican." He co-authored the Taft-Hartley Act regulating labor unions and repeatedly sought the presidential nomination. He died of cancer shortly after becoming Senate Majority Leader.
• 1889 – 1938 Vasily Blyukher (1889-1938) Died 9 November 1938, aged 48 Blyukher was a Marshal of the Soviet Union and commander in the Far East. He was arrested after the Lake Khasan battle and died under NKVD interrogation.
• 1889 – 1950 Vaslav Nijinsky (1889-1950) Died 8 April 1950, aged 61 Vaslav Nijinsky was a Russian ballet dancer and choreographer regarded as one of the greatest male dancers of the 20th century, celebrated for his work with the Ballets Russes. Mental illness ended his career in his late twenties, and he spent much of his later life in institutional care. He died in London.
• 1889 – 1949 Victor Fleming (1889-1949) Died 6 January 1949, aged 59 Victor Fleming was an American film director best known for directing both Gone with the Wind and The Wizard of Oz in 1939. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for Gone with the Wind.
• 1889 – 1956 Risto Ryti Wartime President The 5th President, who sacrificed his career and reputation to sign a pact with Germany to save Finland from Soviet occupation.
• 1889 Meiji Constitution promulgated Japan adopts its first modern constitution Emperor Meiji promulgated the Constitution of the Empire of Japan, establishing a constitutional monarchy with an elected Imperial Diet alongside imperial sovereignty. Modeled partly on Prussian constitutional law, it was the first modern constitution adopted in Asia.
• 1889 Apia cyclone wrecks German and American fleets Storm defuses a naval standoff in Samoa A powerful cyclone struck Apia harbor in Samoa, destroying six German and American warships that had gathered amid a tense standoff for control of the islands. The shared disaster eased the naval confrontation and pushed the powers toward a negotiated settlement of the Samoan crisis.
• 1889 – 1951 Warner Baxter (1889-1951) American actor, the second Best Actor Oscar winner, for In Old Arizona.
• 1889 Eiffel Tower opens Centerpiece of the Paris Exposition Universelle Gustave Eiffel's company completed the wrought-iron tower for the 1889 World's Fair marking the centenary of the French Revolution. At 300 meters it became the tallest man-made structure on Earth, a record it held until 1930.
• 1889 – 1945 Hitler Nazi Germany dictator Adolf Hitler led Nazi Germany, instigating World War II and the Holocaust, resulting in the deaths of six million Jews and millions of others.
• 1889 Oklahoma Land Rush Tens of thousands race to claim unassigned lands At noon on April 22, an estimated 50,000 settlers rushed to stake claims on land in the former Indian Territory opened by the federal government. Those who entered before the legal start time gave rise to the nickname "Sooners."
• 1889 – 1970 António de Oliveira Salazar The Dictator The leader of the Estado Novo (New State), ruling Portugal as an authoritarian for over 36 years.
• 1889 – 1981 Beulah Bondi (1889-1981) American actress who played James Stewart's mother four times, including in It's a Wonderful Life.
• 1889 – 1944 Thomas Midgley Jr Two solutions, two disasters Thomas Midgley solved two real engineering problems brilliantly. Engine knock was limiting compression ratios, so he found tetraethyl lead. Refrigerators were poisoning families with ammonia and methyl chloride, so he found Freon. Both worked perfectly, and between them they put lead into the bloodstream of most of the twentieth century and opened a hole in the ozone layer. The historian J. R. McNeill wrote that he had more impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in the planet's history. He held over a hundred patents and won every major prize American chemistry could give him.
• 1889 Johnstown Flood Dam failure kills over 2,200 in Pennsylvania The South Fork Dam above Johnstown, Pennsylvania, collapsed after days of heavy rain, sending a wall of water through the town and killing more than 2,200 people. It remains one of the deadliest disasters in United States history and prompted Clara Barton's American Red Cross to mount its first major disaster relief effort.
• 1889 The Wall Street Journal begins publication Dow, Jones and Bergstresser launch a financial daily Charles Dow, Edward Jones, and Charles Bergstresser began publishing the Wall Street Journal in New York, building on their existing Dow Jones news service. It grew into one of the most influential financial newspapers in the world.
• 1889 Second International founded Socialist parties unite in Paris Delegates from socialist and labor parties across Europe met in Paris to found the Second International, coordinating the international socialist movement after the collapse of the First International. The founding congress also called for an annual international workers' demonstration on May 1.
• 1889 Nintendo founded Kyoto card maker begins as Nintendo Koppai Fusajiro Yamauchi founded Nintendo Koppai in Kyoto to manufacture handmade Hanafuda playing cards. The small card company later grew into one of the world's largest video game and entertainment companies.
• 1889 – 1976 Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) Died 26 May 1976, aged 86 Martin Heidegger, the German philosopher known for Being and Time and his influence on existentialism and phenomenology, died in Freiburg. His philosophical legacy remains deeply contested because of his membership in the Nazi Party and rectorship of Freiburg University in 1933. He is nonetheless regarded as one of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth century.
• 1889 Moulin Rouge opens Cabaret debuts in Montmartre The Moulin Rouge cabaret opened in the Pigalle district of Paris, identifiable by its red windmill and famed for its can-can dancers. It became a defining symbol of Belle Époque Parisian nightlife.
• 1889 British South Africa Company chartered Royal charter authorizes Cecil Rhodes's colonial expansion The British government granted a royal charter to Cecil Rhodes's British South Africa Company, empowering it to administer and exploit territory in south-central Africa. The company's operations led directly to the colonization of the region later named Rhodesia.
• 1889 Four states admitted to the Union North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Washington join the United States President Benjamin Harrison signed proclamations admitting North Dakota and South Dakota on November 2, followed by Montana on November 8 and Washington on November 11. The near-simultaneous admissions were part of a broader wave of westward statehood in the late 1880s.
• 1889 Proclamation of the Republic in Brazil Military coup ends the Brazilian monarchy Marshal Deodoro da Fonseca led a bloodless military coup that deposed Emperor Pedro II and proclaimed Brazil a republic. Pedro II sailed into exile in Europe, bringing nearly seven decades of Brazilian monarchy to an end.
• 1889 – 1966 Clifton Webb (1889-1966) American actor and dancer, the acid-tongued Waldo Lydecker in Laura and Mr. Belvedere.